


The Space Between

by meeshiefeet



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Oneshot, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-29
Updated: 2016-01-29
Packaged: 2018-05-17 02:08:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5849863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meeshiefeet/pseuds/meeshiefeet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>solace only comes <br/>in knowing you fill the space<br/>between my heartbeats</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Space Between

**Author's Note:**

> This came to me in the middle of the night, somewhere between awake and asleep. It is based on a Caryl-inspired haiku I wrote last year. Thank you to Emily and Liddy for reading, and to Lisa for putting up with my tantrums.

 

_solace only comes_  
_in knowing you fill the space_  
_between my heartbeats_

 

* * *

 

They are safe. For now. The undead remain at bay on the other side of unyielding steel. This man, this so-called doctor, directs them across a sterile lobby. He doesn't trust him. He doesn't trust anyone, except maybe her. The one he knows would understand his secrets, not that she will ever know them. But even she makes him flinch.

They crowd into an elevator, and he relaxes a little when she shuffles into the space next to him before anyone else can. Better her than the others.

 

* * *

 

She sees him. Invades his space. Invades his mind.

All he wants is to find that girl. Nothing else. It's supposed to be black and white, but she defies that simplicity, forcing the grays to appear. Other colors follow. Each word, each look, each hue… they seep into the cracks he didn't know he had. If she keeps this up, keeps filling those places he’s hidden even from himself, she will surely suffocate him.

He panics as she edges her way in anyway, but instead of suffocating, he learns to breathe.

 

* * *

 

He seeks her out, watching. Waiting for the moment when he can approach without prying eyes or pricked ears. It's a fascination, how they have changed. How she seems to create an entire universe, another world that exists only in her presence, only in the space between them.

He catches glimpses of it. In every unspoken conversation. In every slight touch. They sustain him, but he craves more than those fleeting moments. He wants to dwell.

 

* * *

 

He closes his eyes, thinking of how she looked at him as he passed her cell. The way her head tilted slightly, her breath slowing in her chest. He is etching those details into his memory when the curtain at his door drifts open. She is calm, and quiet, and unflinching. He turns toward her, a silent invitation into his space, and clings to the heavy-lidded gaze she offers.

She is so close, and not close enough. Her eyes lock into his and her hands skim softly along his jaw, his neck. She slides the vest from his shoulders, runs her fingers down his weather-worn shirt before pulling her own over her head. He's always thought he'd be afraid when this happened. Nervous. But there's nothing like that. No fear. No doubt. He wraps his arms around her and draws her in. She does the same with her mouth.

They move together, and everything shifts.

It is so clear now, the truth that was written before the stars were born. She is every thought in his head. She is the murmur of his breath. She is the space between his heartbeats… the unseen force that witnesses each one, and in the pause that follows, binds it to the next. She is the difference between living, and a life no better than death.

People always talk about soulmates. Two halves of a whole. He never believed in such things, and now he knows with certainty he is right. They are not halves. They are interwoven, indivisible, one. They have always been, and they will always be. She is not his soulmate. She is his soul.

Her eyes flutter open beneath him, welcoming him, reflecting the delicate spectrum of this new understanding they share. He fills her, as she fills him.

  
No space between.


End file.
